


I Hope You Don't Get The Wrong First Impression

by shrill_fangirl_screaming



Series: all the stony au oneshots [13]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: AU, Ambiguous AU, Emergency Room AU, M/M, Non-power AU, no but seriously ER wait times don't make a hell of a lot of sense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-26
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-25 21:39:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3825988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shrill_fangirl_screaming/pseuds/shrill_fangirl_screaming
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve and Tony meet in a crowded waiting room for the ER, both with minor but debilitating and stupidity-caused injuries. Well, that's one way to meet someone...</p>
<p>(does not have to be read in conjunction with the rest of the series)</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Hope You Don't Get The Wrong First Impression

Steve is going to blame Clint for this until the day they die.

His roommates are fiercely competitive people in general; their prank wars sent Sam to the hospital before Steve put his foot down and established some kind of mediation between wounded parties that did not involve a house-wide brawl. MarioKart, in retrospect, should have been banned from the apartment.

This of course does not excuse the fact that Clint broke Steve’s finger by throwing the controller when Natasha beat him on Rainbow Road. And due to a series of unfortunate events, he had to drive himself to the ER.

It really shouldn’t be standard operating procedure in their house to drive oneself to the ER, but everyone else was drinking and Clint can only legally operate a motorcycle besides. So this is how Steve Rogers finds himself in the ER, alone, cradling his broken finger and waiting for a nurse, or a doctor, or a someone to become available.

“ER wait times are such bullshit, right?” the guy next to him asks.

Steve nods. “I guess doctors are busy?”

The guy quirks up half his mouth in a wry smile. “Still, we have emergencies. I’m Tony, by the way, and I’d offer to shake your hand but doesn’t look like that would be terribly comfortable.”

“Yeah, my friend kind of broke my thumb,” Steve explains.

Tony laughs. “Some friend.”

“We were playing MarioKart.”

“Well, that was your first mistake. What, did you beat him and he snapped your thumb in rage?”

Steve rubs the back of his neck, embarrassed. “Well, another friend won, and he got frustrated and threw the controller without really looking where it was going…”

“But the real question is, how did you place?” Tony asks. “I never get below third unless I’m playing against my one friend Pepper, in which case I can usually scrape fifth.”

“Third, which was the real kicker, because the friend who threw the controller actually beat me. And then broke my thumb. And then couldn’t drive me to the hospital.”

Tony nods. “Shitty friends.”

“Do you have anyone here with you?” Steve asks.

He shakes his head, gesturing at his foot and saying, “Nah, I did this to myself. Got kind of into a project, dropped a sledgehammer on my foot, probably broke something. I Googled my symptoms and it said I should probably get it looked at.” Tony’s left foot was bare, already a dark bluish purple. Steve winces in sympathy. “I tried to put a shoe on and it was slow torture so I just went without.”

Steve grins. “It makes me feel a little less awful about my broken thumb due to MarioKart.”

“Oh, there’s no shame in that,” Tony replies. “I know of a game that ended in a divorce and at least two ruined friendships. If no one’s offended by the end of your game, you’re not playing hard enough.”

Steve looked at his thumb and remembered the prank wars instigated by a MarioKart loss. They were more numerous than he previously realized. “Yeah, I don’t know why we still allow that game in the apartment. I had to ban certain modifications on Nerf weapons when Clint sent Sam to the hospital after his ultra-modified Nerf sniper assault rifle pegged the guy in the eye.”

“Let me guess- Clint is the one who broke your thumb?”

Steve nods. “He gets… enthusiastic. All four of us are really competitive- me, him, Sam, and Natasha. Like, every little thing gets blown obscenely out of proportion and I end up having to break up fistfights.”

“My house seems calm in comparison, now,” Tony quips.

Steve gestures vaguely at him. “What kind of project were you doing that necessitated breaking your foot with a sledgehammer?”

Now it’s Tony’s turn to hem and haw, side-eyeing Steve as if deciding whether or not to tell the truth. “I may have been doing some minor demolition work in my house to make way for large and potentially explosive equipment to make an experimental energy source.”

“No, really,” Steve says with a laugh, “Come on, I told you mine.”

“I’m serious,” Tony replies. “On the upside, it worked.” He pulls a small triangular light out of his pocket. “I probably shouldn’t have brought it to the hospital, but I figure it’s safer on me than left abandoned at home.”

Steve blinks at the little triangle, shining innocuously from Tony’s palm. “You demolished your house to make that.”

“Okay,” Tony says, “I didn’t demolish my house, I punched a few holes in a few walls and the odd floor or two. Also, it provides clean sustainable energy with no emissions, so.” He tucks it back in his pocket where it glows faintly through his breast pocket.

Steve blinks. “And you made that.”

“Not bad for an afternoon’s work.”

“So let’s recap,” Steve says. “I broke my thumb when an overdramatic roommate threw a video game controller at me, and you bruised your foot when creating a clean sustainable energy solution in your _house_.”

Tony holds up a hand. “In all fairness, I literally dropped a sledgehammer on my foot.”

“Still,” Steve replies. “I feel like I should get your autograph or something. What on earth do you do for a living?”

“I work with the university- they give me grants, I partially demolish my house to create experimental energy sources, someday I’ll own a business that pays me to do the same thing.” He pats the glowing pocket proudly. “What about you, what do you do?”

Steve blushes and looks at his feet. “It’s classified.”

A grin lights across Tony’s face. “What?”

“I work for the government, but it’s classified. I can’t tell you,” Steve mumbles, closely examining the toe of his scuffed-up sneaker.

Tony shifts his weight to face Steve, studying his face with eager excitement. “Oh my God, you’re James Bond, aren’t you? CIA, FBI, M16, ABC, whatever? What about your roommates, what do they do?”

Steve swallows hard. “Well, uh, Clint works with me, so it’s classified. Natasha, uh, we don’t know where she works or what she does and we can neither confirm nor deny that she even has a job to begin with and we’re not allowed to take pictures of her that show more than one quarter of her face.”

“And the last one?” Tony asks eagerly.

Steve waves a dismissive hand, looking up at last. “Sam works in Veteran’s Affairs.”

“Anticlimax,” Tony says.

“Yeah, he’s the odd man out,” Steve says. “Although he’s the only one who can tell anyone stories from his work day, so that’s something.”

Tony whistles. “Still. You get to say _it’s classified_ and not get smacked by people who know you’re lying. That’s awesome.”

“Partial house demolition is awesome too,” Steve says, gesturing vaguely at the man’s glowing chest.

Tony studies the other man for a long moment in silence, long enough that Steve starts to shift his weight uncomfortably and wonder what the hell was taking so long with the doctors because this was an emergency room, dammit, and his thumb was broken and that really should be treated as an emergency, but then Tony nods and says, “Yeah, I don’t want to leave here without getting your number.” He slides a sleek rectangle out of his pocket and taps on it before passing it to Steve.

New contact.

Steve blinks, looking at Tony again. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Tony says. “Wait, are you straight, that might cause problems in the future because-“

“Nope,” Steve replies.

Tony grins. “Then, may I have your number please and thank you?”

A slow smile starts to spread across Steve’s face. He passes Tony his phone as he taps in his number. “Let me know if you need a ride to the ER the next time you drop a sledgehammer on your foot while demolishing your house.”

“Partially demolishing, and if I have to wait for that to happen again I won’t text you for at least two weeks and no way in hell am I waiting that long,” Tony replies.

Steve passes him back his phone. “Then I look forward to hearing from you.”

“Dammit, Tony, you’re here again?” A harried-looking redheaded nurse swoops out of the open door and over to Tony. “We see you in here like three times a week, what on Earth have you done this time?”

“Sledgehammer on the foot,” Steve supplies. Tony nods.

The woman looks at them both and sighs. “You’d think as an ER nurse you wouldn’t get returning customers… that’s the second time this month you’ve come in here with a sledgehammered foot, if I didn’t know better I’d think you were hitting on me.”

“Nope,” Tony replies happily, “I’m hitting on him today.” He points at Steve.

Steve waves.

The woman sighs again, pinching her nose. “Tony, we need to get you in to see a doctor, you can flirt with the pretty boy later. Say bye-bye to the pretty boy!” she coos as she pulls him to his feet and away from Steve.

“Bye!” Tony shouts over his shoulder. “I’ll text you!”

Steve smiles and waves, opening his phone to text back, _not if I text you first_.

Before he even gets his thumb looked at, he gets a winky face in return. Steve grins and thinks he just might have to thank Clint for breaking his thumb. It was totally worth it.


End file.
